I just heard that a cryptography professor at Indiana University had his house raided and was fired. Don’t know much more. https://www.heraldtimesonline.com/story/news/local/2025/03/28/fbi-department-of-homeland-security-agents-search-house-in-bloomington-indiana/82710451007/
Xiaofeng’s profile is no longer available on IU sites. So here’s his Google Scholar. https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=pONu-5EAAAAJ&hl=en
@matthew_d_green Is it normal for a university to memory hole a former professor's pages? I thought the norm was to keep scholarship present, but possibly mark it as an inactive page.
@adamshostack @matthew_d_green This is the part that's especially concerning. We don't know what the arrest was about (and whether it was even for a crime or an immigration matter), but it's hard to imagine what reason there could be for the university to scrub its website as if he never worked there.
Either the government put pressure on them or the university was involved in whatever it was about.
@mattblaze @adamshostack @matthew_d_green I emailed the dean (I am on the school's advisory board) asking what's going on.
@mattblaze @adamshostack @matthew_d_green slated a call with the administration (of IU) for this afternoon.
@cigitalgem @mattblaze @adamshostack @matthew_d_green Be strategic in your questions. They're *not* going to tell you what's going on, nor will they say if it's a traditional “spying for China" investigation. They may be willing to say if the situation is related to the current ICE nonsense. No idea if they'll explain why they memory-holed his web page, etc.
@SteveBellovin @mattblaze @adamshostack @matthew_d_green of course. Feel free to email me out of band